1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to air hose coupling devices for rail cars. More specifically, the present invention is directed to a coupling device that allows the joining of air hoses of adjacent cars without the need for manual coupling. A preferred embodiment of the invention comprises an automatic air hose coupling device with a combined male/female coupler head that attaches to standard air hoses via a standard gladhand fitting, permitting the automatic coupler to be disengaged when a railcar is joined with another car that is not similarly equipped with the automatic coupler.
2. Background of the Invention
When assembling a train of railroad cars for transport, it is necessary to mechanically connect them together. It is generally also necessary to connect their electrical and compressed air braking systems. In North America, the mechanical connection of the virtually all freight cars is accomplished through a “knuckle” or AAR Type “E” coupler. Knuckle couplers allow rail cars to be mechanically joined by simply pushing them together; no manual coupling is required. Knuckle couplers are also the strongest coupler in general use today. The design of the knuckle coupler has not changed much since Eli H. Janney obtained U.S. Pat. No. 138,405 for the “Janney” coupler in 1873.
Unfortunately, the knuckle coupler does not provide air brake or other non-mechanical connections automatically. The air brake connections must still be made by workers who connect the air hose from one car to the next by hand. The use of manual air brake couplers thus requires more workers and imposes greater risk than would an automated system in which the air hoses were coupled automatically when the knuckle couplers were engaged.
Several fully automatic coupling systems exist that provide for both mechanical and air hose connections without the need for human intervention. The most common of these is the Scharfenberg coupler, which is used in Europe and elsewhere. However, the Scharfenberg and other fully automatic couplers in use today suffer from two primary disadvantages: First, they are generally only suited for passenger operations, because the mechanical coupler of such automatic couplers usually has a much lower maximum tonnage than a knuckle coupler. Second, none of the fully automatic couplers in use today is compatible with the knuckle coupler, which means that they cannot be used on trains in the United States unless all the cars for a train are fitted with the new couplers. Because there are literally millions of railcars in the United States and Canada with knuckle couplers, and because cars may change trains one or more times en route from one location to another, an “all or nothing” automatic coupler that does not permit incremental introduction is, for all practical purposes, impossible to implement in the United States.